TinyGPS 13 has been released. This latest revision improves the algorithm used to transform the raw NMEA latitude and longitude values into floating-point numbers representing decimal degrees. You may not have noticed any problem, but prior versions of TinyGPS generated values that were accurate to only about 5 decimal digits, or about 1 meter. Version [...]

We’ve been having lots of fun over the last few weeks playing with a revolutionary new satellite communications device by Rock 7 called the RockBLOCK. I say “revolutionary”, because when you hook it up to an Arduino–and this is super easy–you can inexpensively send and receive short “burst” messages for the first time from anywhere [...]

Back in 2009 we published the story of the first Reverse Geocache™ Puzzle. This site has since been a little bit schizophrenic, with articles on Arduino libraries on the one hand, and updates to the famous puzzle box story on the other. Well, today we announce a brand new website dedicated to all things to [...]

It’s 2012 and we Texans are finally enjoying some relief from the hottest and driest year ever recorded. The rain and cool took their time coming. When storms blow through now we huddle at our office windows like clusters of excited honeybees. It’s hard to fight the impulse to wander shirtless in the streets. Quest [...]

I. Seattle Some pretty exciting news came my way last September. My friends at Groundspeak, the international geocaching organization, wrote that their Reverse Geocache™ Puzzle Box had recently facilitated a young coworker’s wedding engagement! (You’ve encountered this very box in an earlier post. I built it to celebrate geocaching’s tenth anniversary—the first commission I ever did.) [...]

Welcome, MAKE readers! I’m very pleased that you dropped by and hope you enjoyed my article on the Reverse Geocache™ Puzzle Box (p. 144 of the January issue). We have a wonderful community of puzzle box owners, builders, and enthusiasts here, centered around the notion of location-based microcontroller projects, and we’d love for you to join [...]

The new year brings another version of the NewSoftSerial library, a beta version 11. Changes since version 10 include: Inheritance from the new Arduino Stream class and commensurate interface adjustments (added peek(), changed signature for available()) write() member is now public, following the lead of Print base class support for Arduino Mega and Mega 2560 [...]

[Author's note: This post is the last in a real-life story that ultimately took a full year and four chapters (1, 2, 3, 4) to tell. Read them all, then browse through the other surprising puzzle box stories that have popped up along the way.] The Box Opens The big news we’ve been waiting so [...]

As you may have read, the nice people at Groundspeak dropped by to interview me about the Reverse Geocache™ Puzzle. These were the folks who discovered afterwards that I had hidden their dinner — actually a gift certificate to a local Mexican restaurant — in one of my “elegant black” puzzle boxes. We had a nice [...]